Theme or amusement park ride attractions have become increasingly popular. Amusement rides can generally be characterized into rides that include ride vehicles that travel along a track and rides that are fixed relative to the ground. In fixed rides, an audience platform or ride vehicle is typically situated on a motion base having multiple degrees of freedom. An amusement ride of this kind is described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,206,230 B2. These types of motion bases are also frequently positioned adjacent to one or more projection screens. A series of images or a motion picture is then projected onto the screen. For added realism and effect, the movement of the motion base can be synchronized with the projected images.
The motion base can move the audience platform in several different directions including angular movements, such as roll, pitch and yam, and linear movements, such as heave and surge. The various degrees of freedom can be used to simulate the effect of actually moving in synchronization with the projected images or motion picture.
While prior art amusement rides have focused on improving the synchronization of the motion base movement with the projected motion picture, those rides often use projection screens that are limited in size. Consequently, prior art amusement rides have the drawback that the projections do not extend over the entire field of view of the individual user resulting in that the audience is not totally immersed into the ride experience.
Accordingly, there is a need for an improved amusement ride having an enhanced experience factor. In particular, it is an object of the instant invention to provide an amusement ride offering an improved ride experience and increasing the audience's immersion into a virtual environment.